Matthew Lloyd
Freelance Consultant in Disaster Response
               Matthew Lloyd is a freelance consultant specialising in disaster response, with experience in:
  1. Selection and use of rugged and simple telecommunications tools:
    1. Satellite:
      1. Broadband, easy to use because it reproduces the office data environment
      2. Narrow band, great for gathering field data and monitoring and managing personnel.  Very: small, efficient, low cost, and tough.
    2. Radio:
      1. HF
      2. VHF
  2. International and national technical disaster response teams:
    1. Selection
    2. Training
    3. Management
    4. Leadership
  3. Packaging disaster response tools into portable “Flyaway” systems, practical and simple to operate where infrastructure is not available.
  4. The (often unpopular) task of differentiating between needs and wants.
  5. Most recent contracts have been for:
    1. The World Food Programme (WFP) Emergency Telecommunications Cluster (ETC) in the Pacific.   Creating a telecoms training course for disaster decision makers.
    2. Australian Red Cross.  A paper considering best practices for introducing technology (Unmanned Air Vehicles, UAVs) into Pacific Island cultures.
 
Matthew attained this position through three major career moves:
  1. Most recently he was employed by New Zealand Red Cross (NZRC, a very satisfying decade and he continues as team leader as a volunteer), in a management role that demanded innovation and leadership:
    1. Recruiting and training technical response teams:
      1. IT and Telecoms Emergency Response Unit (IT&T ERU), based in NZ.
        1. A “surge capacity” tool of the International Federation of Red Cross/Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).  Tasked globally from Geneva
        2. One of only 5 such tools and the only one in the Southern Hemisphere.  The team provides telecommunications hardware and technical support to allow IFRC to function when responding to “world class” disasters (most recently Nepal)
        3. Team members are selected for their intelligence and technical problem solving capabilities (not merely following checklists) whilst living in a chaotic environment
      2. Drought response team, a NZRC based team equipped with the “portable potable” water maker.  Responding rapidly to keep the inhabitants of Pacific atolls alive until such time as the rainwater supply was replenished.
      3. Team members are volunteers until operational deployment when they become fixed term employees of NZRC (with the associated rights and protections of employees).  Maintaining team enthusiasm and commitment between operations, when participation is required without tangible reward, requires considerable people skills and leadership.
    2. Creating “flyaway” kits of technical equipment.  Packaged and weighted to travel by air as personal luggage:
      1. The IT&T ERU immediate use hardware.  By travelling as “personal luggage” (up to ½ a tonne split between a team of 3) the equipment was available as soon as the team arrived.  The remaining equipment, travelling as freight, could take up to two weeks to make the same journey.
      2. Disaster telecoms equipment donated to Pacific Island Red Cross Societies:
        1. Succinct Data, a very low cost, pocket sized, satellite communication system transmitting text through an Iridium short burst data module.  Compression reduces free text by 50%, electronic forms can be compressed by as much as 98%.  Additionally, personnel position and track is displayed on a web portal.
        2. The Talking Briefcase, an Iridium satellite phone packaged to survive disaster and operate indefinitely without supporting infrastructure.
        3. The Talking Suitcase, a complete portable VHF repeater system, including handheld radios and chargers, in one box.
      3. The “portable potable” water maker mentioned above.  Capable of turning seawater, or dirty fresh water, into drinking water, using AC or DC power supplies.   A complete system including two one tonne water storage bladders, sized to fit on the back of a small truck or trailer for distribution.
  2. Manager of field communications for New Zealand’s Department of Conservation (DOC).  DOC is the government department responsible for roughly ⅓ of the NZ land area.  DOC personnel operate in remote wilderness making appropriate telecommunications tools essential for their management and safety.
  3. Matthew commenced his working life as an officer in the Royal Navy, specialising in hunting Soviet submarines from a Sea King helicopter.  This helicopter carried neither satellite communications nor satellite navigation, and habitually operated beyond the radio horizon.  Consequently Matthew, as aircraft captain and scene of action commander, learnt to make decisions autonomously and operate safely in a potentially lethal environment.  For example, the routine task of returning to the only ship that could safely accommodate a Sea King helicopter was made harder by two increasing variables:
    1. The navigation system tracked motion over the sea surface and became less and less precise as hours passed.
    2. The aircraft carrier would certainly not to be where it had planned to be 4 hours previously.